


all the pretty pictures in my head are faded

by MagicaLyss



Series: Bluer Than The Sky (Whumptober 2019) [6]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Dead May Parker (Spider-Man), Foster Care, Gen, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Pepper Potts Is a Good Bro, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker is a Mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-08 00:16:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20984807
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicaLyss/pseuds/MagicaLyss
Summary: Whumptober Day Seven - IsolationEverything was lost in the fire.Peter’s suit, all of Peter’s belongings, everything of May’s, everything that used to belong to Ben.May.Peter lost everything that day.





	all the pretty pictures in my head are faded

Peter hunches his shoulders over his body, making himself as small as he can. The smaller he is, the less noticed he’ll be, the less people will look at him.  
  


He can feel the eyes on him as he makes his way down the school hallway. He’s been out of school for the past two weeks while he’s been unable to find a placement. They still haven’t found one, but he’s been allowed to go back to school to make sure he doesn’t fall too drastically behind everyone else.  
  


Books heavy in his arms, Peter flushes with embarrassment. He doesn’t have much anymore. Wearing a pair of jeans that barely stay up around his thin waist and a ratty t-shirt that’s been stained too many colors that Peter didn’t bother asking what they were or where they came from.  
  


Ned appears at his side, eyes wide with confusion.  
  


“I’ve been trying to get a hold of you for weeks! Where have you been? Was there a… you know?”  
  


“No, Ned,” Peter sighs, voice hoarse from disuse. “I can’t talk about that anymore. My suit’s gone.”  
  


Ned’s jaw drops. “Gone? What do you mean it’s-”  
  


“I don’t want to talk about it, Ned. Please,” Peter says, head bowed in passivity. “What class is it?”  
  


Thankfully, Ned drops the subject and leads Peter to Chemistry, not questioning Peter’s holey shoes or smelly shirt or greasy hair. Peter’s never been more grateful for Ned’s undying loyalty and friendship.  
  


  
*

Peter goes straight to bed when he gets home. He arrives exactly an hour and five minutes before the other kids in the in-between home because they all go to a school in the town on the other side of the city. Cheap but they have to make it through traffic.  
  


His bed is uncomfortable and he shares the room with four other boys. There are another nineteen kids in the in-between home, split between six bedrooms. It’s too much for the home, they’re not supposed to be home to more than ten kids, but apparently there’s too many kids who don’t have anywhere to go.  
  


The adults in the house are nice enough, but they’re too stressed trying to gain more funds from the government to have the money to care for the kids they have in their home.  
  


Everything was lost in the fire.  
  


Peter’s suit, all of Peter’s belongings, everything of May’s, everything that used to belong to Ben.  
  


May.  
  


Peter lost _everything _that day.  
  


The only reason he was okay was because he was running out to get some groceries for May. He _insisted _May stayed home…  
  


It’s his fault. So he deserves to live in small room with strangers and nothing to rely on.  
  


He deserves anything that comes to him.  
  


  
*

The other kids get home in exactly the allotted amount of time.  
  


Peter hasn’t made any friends here yet. The majority of the kids know that friends you make in homes like these are hard to keep. Everyone’s going different places some point or another.  
  


Everyone holds hands around the table. Not because they’re forced to pray, but there’s a few people around the table who do pray or are religious, so they include everyone as a way to make it feel more like a family, to make them feel a little less alone.  
  


“Amen,” one of the boys at the end of the table says. All twenty-eight of them, including the caretakers, struggle to fit around the dining room table, but they make it work, sitting elbow to elbow, knee to knee.  
  


A few of the people around the table echo their own versions of amen back to him, but otherwise, the dining room is quiet, not a single noise out of place.  
  


  
*

Peter’s never been very good with names and being in an in-between home means he has twenty-three people he’s supposed to consider friends or ‘short-term sibling.’  
  


He doesn’t even know the name of the boy sleeping on the bunk above his. It’s not as though he doesn’t care about them specifically, he just doesn’t care about much at all.  
  


“You up, New Kid?” a voice whispers.  
  


“Yeah,” Peter says hoarsely. He doesn’t speak much anymore.  
  


“Welcome to The Unwanted.”  
  


  
*

“We’re just here to help, Peter.”  
  


The stupid lady has a fake smile plastered on her face, red-painted lips curved up but not moving past her mouth.  
  


Luckily, Grace is sitting next to her, rolling her eyes along with Peter. She’s one of the workers at the in-between house. One of the most understanding out of the group of six workers.  
  


“I don’t need help,” Peter replies. It’s not the right answer, of course, he needs help. But he doesn’t _deserve _help.  
  


“Peter,” Grace murmurs warningly.  
  


“You’ve lost a lot, honey, I understand it can be-”  
  


“What do you understand about any of this?” Peter demands, anger flaring inside his chest. He ignores Grace’s warning look and the lady’s pen moving across the page, probably writing some bullshit about his ‘anger issues’ or something.  
  


“I’m going to have to ask you to take a breath, honey-”  
  


“Stop!” Peter shouts, voice breaking as he stands up abruptly. “Stop it! I’m not going to fucking calm down! You have no idea what I’ve been through, okay? So stop pretending like your fancy degree is going to help you understand _anything_!”  
  


Grace stands up, sadness in her eyes and disappointment curving her mouth down. “Peter, if you don’t apologize, you’ll have to be punished.”  
  


He slams his phone down on the desk, barely even wincing when he hears a crack, super strength forgotten.  
  


“Fine, do you think I give a fuck? Take my phone, take my things, take whatever you want. I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care!”  
  


Grace’s hand is cold on his elbow. She knows he won’t be violent towards her, they say he’s the most passive person they’ve ever had in their short-term home.  
  


“C’mon, Peter, let it go,” she says. She doesn’t sound angry, just disappointed. Peter’s not surprised, it’s been two weeks and he’s refused to speak about anything. “Let’s go back to your room.”  
  


“I wanna go home!” he shouts, pulling his arm away from her hand as tears fill his eyes and distort the room. “I just wanna go home.”  
  


His anger disappears too suddenly, like the plug’s been pulled, and he’s left with emptiness. A May-sized gap in his chest. His knees buckle and Grace barely has the time to catch him and lower him to the chair.  
  


Grace doesn’t say anything as the dam breaks and Peter begins to cry, hiding his face in his hands, simply keeps a hand on his back and the other on his arm, and lets him cry.

  
*

Peter wanders the streets of New York.  
  


His body feels empty like a cavern, but like there are weights tied to his ankles.  
  


The world around him is static.  
  


One foot after the next.  
  


He stops when he reaches a set of revolving glass doors. Looking up, he finds he reached Stark towers in his dazed movements. He supposes he’s just trying to find anything familiar. The only thing he’s got right now is Ned, but he shattered his phone and he’s been suspended ever since he broke Flash’s nose when he said something about May.  
  


“Peter?” A woman gasps.  
  


He turns slowly, the colors of the world greying and blurred, drained of the light it used to have. Pepper’s standing on the sidewalk, a tray of coffees balanced in one hand and her phone in the other. She’s probably just coming back from the meetings she had in Long Island, Peter saw it on the news in the short-term home.  
  


Peter doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say, so he doesn’t say anything at all.  
  


Pocketing her phone, Pepper steers Peter by the shoulders into the building and onto the elevator.  
  


“FRI, alert Tony. Tell him to meet us up there.” Pepper’s voice sounds like she’s underwater.  
  


The next thing Peter knows, he’s sitting on a plush couch, a blanket pulled tight around his shoulders, a mug in his hand. He can’t remember the walk from the elevator to the couch or where Pepper went or when he got the mug, but it doesn’t seem too important.  
  


Not when he sees Tony, socked feet against the hardwood, a pair of loose sweatpants, an oily t-shirt, mussed hair.  
  


“Peter,” Tony breathes.  
  


Suddenly, he’s being engulfed in a warm embrace and he can’t help but sink into the hug, having been desperate for something like this for a very, very long time.  
  


His brain is elsewhere though. “Not supposed to be out late.”  
  


“Yeah, I know, kid, your curfew was hours ago. What-”  
  


“Not curfew.” Peter makes his eyes focus on Tony’s warm brown ones, only a few feet away from him. “May’s gone. Grace can’t make rules.”  
  


“What?” Tony says. His eyebrows are furrowed, deeper wrinkles in his forehead when he makes that face. “What happened, kid? You’ve been totally MIA for two weeks. No activity, no texts, no calls, I thought you’d been kidnapped.”  
  


Peter takes a long breath. He’s too far gone to feel _anything _when he explains.  
  


“May’s gone. Dead gone,” he says. Grief is routine. “Couldn’t save her. Halfway home.”  
  


Tony sucks in a sharp breath, moving too fast for Peter’s molasses brain as he begins pacing the room.  
  


“What do you mean? Jesus, kid, what the hell?”  
  


Pepper appears out of the blue, a sympathetic expression plastered on her face. Peter’s starting to miss Grace.  
  


“Is there anything you need, honey?”  
  


Peter’s sick of being called honey.  
  


“I’m okay,” Peter says. He plasters on one of their fake smiles, daring anyone to call out the lies. “Should be back there.”  
  


Static.  
  


He can see Tony’s mouth moving, room blurring around him as he struggles to focus, but none of the words compute. All of them lost in the vastness of his mind.  
  


“-sleep,” Pepper’s saying to Tony. “No good now.”  
  


And Tony’s nodding and then his hands are on Peter’s shoulders and he’s being pushed gently horizontal on the couch, a pillow under his head and blankets under his chin. Tony keeps his hands on him, running through his hair or rubbing soothing circles into Peter’s back or smoothing his thumb over Peter’s cheekbone.  
  


  
*

When he wakes up, things aren’t any better by a long shot.  
  


But he has Tony.  
  


Hope blossoms in the May-shaped hole in his chest.

  
Maybe he doesn't have to be temporary or isolated or filled with static. Maybe, just maybe, he deserves help and permanence. 

**Author's Note:**

> i dont know what this is sorry this was like a million different ideas failed to be pulled together


End file.
